NEIGHBOURHOOD ROCKED

Residents of a quiet Mill Woods cul-de-sac were shocked yesterday to
find out that a neighbourhood couple had been picked up in a
$2-million police drug swoop. It turns out the older couple didn't
really live at 652 Lee Ridge Rd. at all. "They moved in about a year
and a half ago and seemed like nice people," said neighbour Bill Buck.

"Every second day you'd see them out raking the yard. When I welcomed
them to the neighbourhood, they said they didn't speak much English."

Buck said the man of the house told him he was a welder.

"He said, 'Me work hard for $16 an hour,'" said Buck.

But police Green Team member Clayton Sach said no one lived in the
home. "There was nothing in there," he said. "Just a marijuana grow
operation."

The house at Lee Ridge Road was one of three grow operations busted by
the joint Edmonton Police Service-RCMP Green Team Wednesday night and
yesterday morning.

The team had a house at 8323 42 Ave. under observation Wednesday
afternoon and when they executed a search warrant, they found 860
marijuana plants valued at $860,000.

That led to two further police raids on homes in the Mill Woods area
Wednesday. At 3673 86 St., officers seized over 17 kg of marijuana
bud. They also raided homes at 388 Richfield Rd. and 107 Lee Ridge Rd.
More than $80,000 in cash and bank drafts was found.

And yesterday they busted grow-ops at 652 Lee Ridge Rd. - where 669
marijuana plants were found - and 766 Johns Rd. Last night officers
were still searching the home at Johns Road, but estimated there were
300 plants there.

Buck, 59, said once police turned up at Lee Ridge Road, things started
to make sense. "Sometimes there'd be a sweet smell coming from the
place. We thought it was just their cooking. In the spring I noticed
the stains on the siding, but I thought they just had ventilation problems."

Sach said a classic sign of a grow operation is condensation or mould
on home sidings. "The first place we raided was black with mould," he
said. "It was the worst I've ever seen."

Sach said a lot of effort had gone into making it look as though
people lived in the grow-op homes. "There was a kid's jumping horse on
the porch of the house at Johns Road. But these guys don't live where
they run the grow operations."

Dennis Davison, 21, said he was also fooled into thinking a family
lived in the house at 652 Lee Ridge Rd.

"They seemed a really nice family, a man, woman and five
kids."

Hanh Thi Tran, 31, and Dum Huu Tran, 46, face two charges of
production of marijuana, three charges of possession for the purposes
of trafficking, two counts of theft of electricity, and two counts of
possession of the proceeds of crime.

Khu Thi Du, who also goes by the last name Tran, 55, has been charged
with two counts each of production of marijuana, possession for the
purposes of trafficking, theft of electricity, and one count of
possession of the proceeds of crime.

Bin Boi Du, 64, and Phong Quan Du, 28, are both charged with
possession of the proceeds of crime.